


Night Terrors

by wintershellraiser



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Bucky Barnes Has Nightmares, F/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Psychological Trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-17
Updated: 2021-02-17
Packaged: 2021-03-12 09:35:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,151
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29507715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wintershellraiser/pseuds/wintershellraiser
Summary: Bucky has night terrors and you do your best to help him.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Reader
Kudos: 23





	Night Terrors

**Author's Note:**

> This is the first Bucky fic I've written, I hope it's okay.

He was like a skittish, defensive dire wolf who wasn’t afraid to snap his jaws as a warning, but the man was always accused of being violent. His defense mistaken for aggression…it always was.

He didn’t like anyone coming close to him out of fear of hurting them and out of an instinct to keep himself safe. Hydra really screwed with his head, he became a weary man. One who stuck to the shadows when he could and didn’t like going out, Hydra had eyes everywhere, he didn’t want to get taken back. His trust was difficult to gain, he tended to isolate himself more often than socializing.

Being around him required patience and a nurturing instinct, you needed to be able to read body language and understand how he felt without words. He did try, but sometimes he was more comfortable keeping his mouth shut, as that is what he was taught to do. Speak when spoken to, as if ‘mission report’ were a trigger to open his mouth. He thought about how often he was mocked by the man who commanded him last, he didn’t know the man’s name. It wasn’t important. Only that he was in charge. His handler. His master. How he grew nauseous thinking of that man in such a way. He’d be lucky to be free from that mask they put him in, muzzling him like a dog. Shocking him when he disobeyed, sometimes he worried if he would turn into a mindless zombie or some sort of robot. 

Even escaped, he had trouble functioning. Pouring himself a glass of milk took so much willpower, it exhausted him to even decide if he should do it or not. He waited until you suggested something before using that as an okay to proceed with the task. You were aware of how hard it was for him, you did your best to help, but there was only so much you could do for him. There were some things he had to overcome himself, a mental struggle that you could help with but when it comes down to it…it’s him that makes the final decision. 

You could hardly blame the tortured man, Bucky had been through more than anyone you knew. The experiences and methods he endured were horrific to hear about, to know existed. It broke yet infuriated your heart, an overwhelming sense to protect him washed over your body and you wanted to save him from himself and his mind. Someone who had been through so much had his demons, and they were the loudest at night. Ripping him apart from the inside out, as they did to him. Masked demons, holding electric prods and syringes to keep him drugged and under control. He wasn’t scared of them. He was terrified. He kept a brave face but inside it troubled him severely. 

They took and took and took from him, sleep was damn near impossible. Chronic and violent night terrors plagued him, and he remembered every single one—just as he did his victims. Peaceful sleep was a dream to him, but never would it be a reality. Because of this, you had a sleep routine in place to try to help as much as you could. You both changed into fresh pajamas, brushed your teeth, got ice water, put on a vaporizer or air cleanser, and played music on the vinyl player. You usually had a background audio on to distract Bucky from the eerie silence night brought on but it brought you comfort too. It aided you to sleep easier, in a weird way. 

Bucky was always the first to bed, laying down on the soft mattress and never holding back a heavy sigh. He had slept in a tube on ice and an old mattress—the springs worn so badly they prodded into his back muscles—on the ground for as long as he could remember, before he slept on the ground in trenches. He doesn’t remember ever feeling good going to sleep, not until he had your bed to lay on. You even went the extra mile and bought him the pillows he liked, the ones that were firm until you laid on them, indenting where you laid and staying fluffy where you didn’t. He thought the term you told him was ‘memory foam’ but he couldn’t properly remember in his tired state.

You came into the room and set both glasses of water on your nightstand, sliding into the bed with him. Bucky made room, lifting his metal arm so you could easily slide in next to him. He liked to sleep with his metal arm around you so he knew you’d be safe, he wasn’t always this open about sleeping so close, thus explains the couch in your bedroom. You slept on the couch, insisting him he deserved the bed, so he could feel more comfortable getting used to sleeping in a room with someone else. He was mostly worried about hurting you, the first few night he had accidentally done so, often resulting in an enormous wave of guilt on his end. It took multiple days to come down from them. 

He held you flush against him so you were nice and snug, protecting you the best he could during the night. The security was for himself too, feeling that you were there calmed him down. His arm weighed on him and was uncomfortable to sleep with, straining his muscles and causing his scar to stretch painfully with the weight. Your body helped relieve a lot of the pain, which is another reason why he liked having you there. If it got cold, his body shivered violently at night, the metal a freezing limb he couldn’t get away from, thus the many heated blankets that were on all night, to try to keep his arm warmed for him. You truly thought of everything, took everything into accord. You were the only one to do so. 

With a kiss to your cheek and one to his, you both dozed off snug against one another. You both knew deep down it wouldn’t last, but you hoped it would. 

It didn’t.

Hours into the late night, you were awoken by the clicking of metal and the bed shifting beneath Bucky’s weight. His turning was rough, his face contorted into worried and fearful expressions. Mumbles and whimpers fell out of his lips as he tried to escape from his own nightmare. Sometimes, waking him suddenly caused him to lash out, not purposefully of course, his mind was projecting figures into the room that weren’t there and he was just trying to defend himself. He was just scared. 

His whines grew louder, his turning faster, the words mumbling from his lips broke your heart and you made a decision. 

“No…no please…don’t, please no…stop!” Bucky’s frantic panting turned into whimpers as he tried to turn and get away from whatever, or whoever, is torturing him. Your hand shook his flesh shoulder, at first gently to try to lure him out of the trap without startling him. After it didn’t work, you went for the second tactic of holding his shoulder a little tighter and shaking harder. “Stop it, stop it, don’t do it!” He continued to recite the nightmare, rolling over onto his back, he was crying in his sleep. Tears streaking down his temples while his bottom lip trembled. “Нет! Нет! Я этого не сделаю!” With that his eyes shot open and instinctively, his left arm swung. You had been with him long enough to know what to do. You ducked and avoided the hit, quickly standing so he could have a minute to breathe and come to reality. 

His breathing was erratic and shallow, panic had set in and your queue to help him struck your core. Bucky’s hands clenched the bed as he screwed his eyes shut to try to focus on what was real, to knock the plague from his memory. “Bucky,” you spoke softly, still startling the man upright, his fists balled and eyes open wide. You couldn’t tell if they held terror, hostility, or both at this point. “Bucky, it was just a nightmare, breathe…breathe with me.” The one thing you could recognize was his incoming panic attack. Bucky was sometimes hard to reach after these terrors and it caused people around him to become frustrated, which triggers his panic. The stress of trying to keep it all inside was overwhelming for his already exhausted psyche. 

The whirring of his arm snapped you from your thoughts, “Please, breathe with me,” you cooed calmly, showing him a deep breath and releasing it slowly as you slowly approached him, “Copy me, like this,” you repeated the action and he watched. The third breath you took, Bucky cooperated and mimicked you. Small praises left your lips to encourage him to continue. You gently held his cheeks and stroked your thumbs on his cheekbones to help ground him. The two of you breathed together as the panic soon quieted itself, his shaky breaths slow and more steady than before. This is when he caught memory of everything more clearly, now that he was awake, he remembered more. A painful wail left his body as if he were releasing a demon, your first instinct was to engulf him. As you did so, Bucky let everything out. It was the same every night but it was never any less painful to hear. The love of your life sobbing from the trauma he endured at the hands of Hydra. The pained sounds leaving him didn’t sound human which only fueled your rage towards the horrific organization, your protective instinct over him grew stronger. 

His stormy eyes looked up to you, red, puffy, and wet. You cooed sadly and pulled him tighter into you, his head resting against your chest while your arms cradled him. Your hands could swipe tears from his cheeks if needed. You gave him enough space to pull back if he wanted, but Bucky wished for nothing more than to be engulfed in your arms while you whispered to him. It was grounding and aided in his recovery a lot more than you thought. “Everything’s okay…” you started once you knew he could hear you through hiccups. He only let himself be seen like this with you, vulnerable and at his rawest. No one else could see, he didn’t trust anyone else like he trusted you. 

“Keep talking, please.” He whispered quietly, anything to take his mind from the picture show of horrors.

“Take it you don’t wanna talk about it?” You asked, fingers gently curling through his hair just the way he liked it. Bucky sighed, shaking his head, “No. I’d rather just forget about it. It’s in the past…” 

“It still bothers you though…” you sighed sadly, he squeezed your body gently in reassurance. 

“I know.” He sighed back, it was heavy with sorrow.

“Do you feel okay now? Safe at least?” Safety was important for the both of you, as Bucky had to hide from the public for years, he’s still hiding. But at least he isn’t alone. 

“I feel a little better…I don’t know if I’ll fall asleep again.” A lie, he always does, his body was always tired out after attacks like that. Yours did when you had your own, so you could easily assume the same for him, super serum or not. He was still a human. 

“Can you lay with me at least?” You asked sweetly, still cradling him. It was something he couldn’t resist, so of course he laid down and laid his metal arm limply around you. He would be snug and secure at your side, where he belonged, where he liked to be. His soft hair curled around your fingers and he hummed happily into you. His tired voice mumbled into your chest, rumbling from his throat and tickling your skin. It was a comfort for you and you made sure to return the touches back to him with gentle scratching or rubbing. 

Within minutes, he was lulled back to sleep, a victory for you. This time, you held him through the night. Making sure that even in his sleep, he was safe. The first terror was always the hardest but once he got over it, he could rest better. He breathed quietly, Bucky didn’t snore, in fact he was a near silent sleeper. Training taught him that. His breaths were quiet and steady, telling you his sleep wasn’t plagued anymore. The nightmare passed, so he could rest comfortably now. You still rubbed his back and kept him warm, angling his arm over you. You began to drift too, you swore you could feel his arm tighten or his lips smile against you. 

Whether or not it was real, your lips displayed a tired smile too.


End file.
